64x32 RGB LED Matrix - 3mm pitch

Description

Bring a little bit of Times Square into your home with this sweet 64 x 32 square RGB LED matrix panel. These panels are normally used to make video walls, here in New York we see them on the sides of busses and bus stops, to display animations or short video clips. We thought they looked really cool so we picked up a few boxes of them from a factory.

This version is the 3mm pitch 64x32 RGB LED Matrix. Please note you cannot use an Arduino UNO to drive this size, its way too big! Use an Arduino Mega, Raspberry Pi, BBB or other device that can handle displaying to RGB matricies and has plenty of RAM.

This matrix has 2048 bright RGB LEDs arranged in a 64x32 grid on the front. On the back there are two IDC connectors (one input, one output: in theory you can chain these together) and 12 16-bit latches that allow you to drive the display with a 1:16 scan rate.

These displays are technically 'chainable' - connect one output to the next input - but our Arduino example code does not support this (yet).

We also include 4 mounting screws and mini-magnets (it appears these are often mounted on a magnetic base).

Keep in mind that these displays are designed to be driven by FPGAs or other high speed processors: they do not have built in PWM control of any kind. Instead, you're supposed to redraw the screen over and over to 'manually' PWM the whole thing. On a 16 MHz Arduino Mega, we managed to squeeze 12-bit color (4096 colors) with 40% CPU usage but this display would really shine if driven by any FPGA, CPLD, Propeller, XMOS or other high speed multi-core controller. The good news is that the display is pre-white balanced with nice uniformity so if you turn on all the LEDs it's not a particularly tinted white.

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NAMEDESCRIPTION

Ordering full reels vs. cut reels

Adafruit NeoPixel Digital RGB LED strips come to us in 4 or 5 meter reels with a 2 or 3-pin JST SM connector on each end and separated power/ground wires as shown in the pic below. If you order a full 4 or 5 meters, you get the full reel with both connectors installed (like the pic below).

If you buy less than a full reel, you'll get a single strip, but it will be a cut piece from a reel which may or may not have a connector on it. If the piece comes from the end of the reel, the connector may be on the output end of the strip!